The present disclosure is related generally to the field of dental treatment. More particularly, the present disclosure is related to methods, devices, and systems for adjustment of tooth position in a virtual dental model.
Dental treatments may involve repositioning misaligned teeth and changing bite configurations for improved cosmetic appearance and dental function. Orthodontic repositioning can be accomplished, for example, by applying controlled forces to one or more teeth over a period of time.
As an example, orthodontic repositioning may be provided through a dental process that uses positioning appliances for realigning teeth. Such appliances may utilize a thin shell of material having resilient properties, referred to as an “aligner,” that generally conforms to a patient's teeth but is slightly out of alignment with a current tooth configuration.
Placement of such an appliance over the teeth may provide controlled forces in specific locations to gradually move the teeth into a new configuration. Repetition of this process with successive appliances in progressive configurations can move the teeth through a series of intermediate arrangements to a final desired arrangement.
Such systems typically utilize materials that are light weight and/or transparent to provide as a set of appliances that can be used serially such that as the teeth move, a new appliance can be implemented to further move the teeth.
With computing device-aided teeth treatment systems, an initial digital data set (IDDS) representing an initial tooth arrangement may be obtained. The IDDS may be obtained in a variety of ways.
For example, the patient's teeth may be imaged to obtain digital data using direct and/or indirect structured light, X-rays, three-dimensional X-rays, lasers, destructive scanning, computing device-aided tomographic images or data sets, magnetic resonance images, intra-oral scanning technology, photographic reconstruction, and/or other imaging techniques. The IDDS can include an entire mouth tooth arrangement, some, but not all teeth in the mouth, and/or it can include a single tooth.
A positive model and/or negative impression of the patient's teeth or a tooth may be scanned using an X-ray, laser scanner, destructive scanner, structured light, and/or other range acquisition system to produce the IDDS. The data set produced by the range acquisition system may be converted to other formats to be compatible with the software which is used for manipulating images within the data set, as described herein.
After scanning, a virtual dental model including teeth of an upper jaw and a lower jaw may be generated. However, the upper jaw and lower jaws of the virtual dental model may not be aligned with respect to each other. Thus, a bite setting operation may be performed to align the virtual dental model including the upper and lower jaws. Other operations may be performed to reposition the teeth within the virtual dental model to a desired final position representing a desired final position for the physical teeth of the patient.